Mark Morgan, then-acting commissioner Customs and Border Protection, speaks at the National Press Club in Washington on Dec. 20, 2019. (Samira Bouaou/The Epoch Times) Immigration & Border Security

By Samuel Allegri March 24, 2021 Updated: March 24, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

Former U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Commissioner Mark Morgan said that the Biden administration’s policies on the border are detrimental for the nation.

“This administration is absolutely—has dismantled everything, and everything that they’re doing is against the nation’s best interest, and I believe it’s for perceived political gain,” Morgan told Just the News.

Morgan then elaborated on unofficial illegal immigration numbers.

“I think within the last 10-11 days, they actually had a single-day encounter of over 6,000. Have you seen that officially? Has anyone in [the Department of Homeland Security] reported that? No. Six thousand! They’re averaging, now, anywhere between probably about 4,500 to 5,000 a day.”

“But here’s the truth, and here’s the stat they’re not presenting officially: 75 percent of the so-called unaccompanied minors are older teenagers—15, 16, 17 years of age,” Morgan told the outlet.

“They’re not being ripped from their parents. They’re making a tough decision on their own to leave simply because they want a better job in the United States.”

Morgan further noted that over 20,000 people have been released since January by mandate of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and that three-quarters of those being labeled as unaccompanied miners are older teenagers.

Morgan then said that DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas wasn’t honest regarding the border’s security.

“So, and this is one of the most disgusting lies—lie—that came out of the mouth of the DHS Secretary when he said, ‘The southwest border is secure.’ … And the 63,000 men and women of CBP on the frontlines of our nation, on the southwest border, know that’s a lie,” Morgan said.

On Tuesday, 14 Republican congressmembers demanded an explanation over “troubling reports” that illegal immigrants are being released into the United States with no court dates.

Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) said in a letter to Mayorkas that the senators are “seeking answers to recent troubling reports that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is releasing aliens who entered the country illegally without the aliens being given Notices to Appear (NTA.)”

“Despite your repeated claims that ‘the border is secure,’ these reports raise serious questions about DHS’s commitment to faithfully enforcing the law,” reads the letter, which was obtained by Fox News.

The outlet reported that during the weekend, migrants were being processed and released without NTA in the Rio Grande Valley sector.

President Joe Biden delivers remarks in Washington on March 15, 2021. (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters) Immigration & Border Security

By Jack Phillips March 24, 2021 Updated: March 24, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) confirmed reports it is investigating President Joe Biden’s move in January to freeze construction of the border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Former President Donald Trump, who made border wall construction a key 2016 campaign promise, started building the wall amid legal battles and fights with Congress. On his first day in office, Biden used his executive authority to stop building the wall even after Congress approved $1.4 billion for the measure as part of a $900 billion stimulus package bill to offset losses incurred by the COVID-19 pandemic in December.

Politico first reported that GAO would now launch an inquiry into whether the Biden administration had violated any laws by freezing construction, which would contravene the Constitution’s law that allows Congress alone to allocate funds.

A spokesperson for the watchdog agency confirmed the report, telling The Epoch Times on Wednesday, “Yes, we received a congressional request for a legal opinion on the matter and we have accepted that request.”

The exact nature of the investigation was not disclosed.

Some senators, who spoke to Politico, noted that Biden was a member of the Senate for decades and should know the rules.

“He was in the Congress a long time,” Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) told the political news website. “He knows it’s the Congress’s job to authorize how the money is spent and the president’s job to spend it efficiently.”

The president suspended construction on his first day in office, on Jan. 20, and also rescinded several other Trump-era immigration rules. Biden termed the border wall wasteful spending.

“Like every nation, the United States has a right and a duty to secure its borders and protect its people against threats. But building a massive wall that spans the entire southern border is not a serious policy solution,” Biden said in his order. “It is a waste of money that diverts attention from genuine threats to our homeland security.”

The president’s order further stipulated that “no more American taxpayer dollars” should be “diverted to construct a border wall,” adding the federal government would conduct “a careful review of all resources appropriated or redirected to construct a southern border wall.”

Meanwhile, more than 60 Republican House lawmakers and four GOP senators wrote to GAO on Tuesday.

“We are writing to be added as co-requesters of a March 17, 2021 letter, signed by 40 United States Senators, requesting the Government Accountability Office’s legal opinion on the actions of the Biden Administration to suspend border wall construction and to order a freeze of funds provided by Congress for that purpose, which we believe violated the Impoundment Control Act,” the lawmakers said in a letter to the GAO.

Republicans have seized on Biden’s immigration orders, including the president’s support of a pathway to citizenship for 11 million illegal immigrants living in the United States, and said the orders are responsible for the surge along the U.S.-Mexico border. White House officials, including Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, have said Trump left Biden a broken immigration system and they’re working to fix it.

The border crisis “is the result of President Trump’s dismantlement of the safe and orderly immigration processes that were built over many, many years by presidents of both parties,” Mayorkas said in a TV interview Sunday.

But Trump, in a rare interview this week with Fox News, said Biden is actively working to “destroy” the United States with his orders.

“You can’t take millions of people, they’ll have millions of people before this mess is over,” Trump said. “We want people to come in, but they have to be able to help our country. They have to come in through merit and they have to come in legally,” the former commander-in-chief remarked.

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https://www.conservativedailynews.com/2021/03/how-history-homer-and-physics-forever-changed-voting-and-politics/

A Facebook panel is seen during the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, in Cannes, France, on June 20, 2018. (Eric Gaillard/Reuters) Social Media

By Samuel Allegri March 22, 2021 Updated: March 22, 2021

Facebook on March 22 issued an announcement on how it plans to combat misinformation on its platforms. The technology giant also said it took down 1.3 billion fake accounts between October and December 2020.

“Tackling misinformation actually requires addressing several challenges including fake accounts, deceptive behavior, and misleading and harmful content,” Guy Rosen, vice president of integrity at Facebook, wrote in the statement.

Rosen said they have a group of “more than 80 independent fact-checkers, who review content in more than 60 languages,” and if they judge something as untrue, the content’s dissemination is limited.

“When they rate something as false, we reduce its distribution so fewer people see it and add a warning label with more information for anyone who sees it,” Rosen wrote.

He also noted that once one of these labels is applied, the vast majority of people don’t click on the post.

“We know that when a warning screen is placed on a post, 95% of the time people don’t click to view it,” he said.

The company published its policies before a U.S. House Committee on Energy and Commerce investigation into how tech platforms are tackling misinformation.

Rosen wrote that Facebook suppresses the distribution of “Pages, Groups, and domains who repeatedly share misinformation,” with a particular emphasis on “false claims about COVID-19 and vaccines and content that is intended to suppress voting.”

Rosen said the platform uses both people and artificial intelligence to detect activity they’re looking to combat, adding that they now have 35,000 people working on it.

“As a result, we’ve removed more than 12 million pieces of content about COVID-19 and vaccines,” he said.

Facebook Fact-Checker Funded by Chinese Money

While Facebook portrays its army of fact-checkers as independent, the money behind at least one carries a distinct taint.

Lead Stories is partly paid through a partnership with TikTok, a social media platform run by a Chinese company that owes its allegiance to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Moreover, the organization that’s supposed to oversee the quality of fact-checkers is run by Poynter Institute, another TikTok partner.

Lead Stories says it’s been contracted by ByteDance “for fact-checking-related work,” referring to TikTok’s announcement earlier this year that it has partnered with several organizations “to further aid our efforts to reduce the spread of misinformation,” particularly regarding the CCP virus pandemic, which originated in China and was exacerbated by the CCP regime’s coverup.

Lead Stories was started in 2015 by Belgian website developer Maarten Schenk, CNN veteran Alan Duke, and two lawyers from Florida and Colorado. It listed operating expenses of less than $50,000 in 2017, but had expanded sevenfold by 2019, largely because of the more than $460,000 Facebook paid it for fact-checking services in 2018 and 2019. The company took on more than a dozen staffers, about half of them CNN alumni, and became one of Facebook’s most prolific fact-checkers of U.S. content.

Petr Svab contributed to this report.

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem gives a State of the State address in Pierre, S.D., on Jan. 8, 2019. (James Nord/AP Photo) Policy

By Masooma Haq March 22, 2021 Updated: March 22, 2021

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem on Monday announced the formation of a national coalition to “Defend Title IX” to protect the rights of female athletes and keep competition fair.

During a press conference Monday morning, Noem said, “Today we’re announcing that we’re forming a coalition called DefendTitleIXNow.com,” referring to the federal law that prohibits discrimination based on sex in educational programs and activities. “The coalition will consist of athletes, leaders, and everybody who cares about protecting women’s sports.”

Noem said that the coalition is separate from the debate surrounding House Bill 1217, titled Promote Continued Fairness in Women’s Sports, which bars biological males from competing in women’s or girls’ sports, because the coalition’s focus will be on women’s rights and maintaining a fair competitive environment in women’s sports and Title IX, not transgender athletes rights.

However, the governor said one of the main motivators for creating the coalition is to build enough support to push back against any pressure from groups like the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), which insists on requiring biological males be included in girls’ sports.

“Once we have enough states on board, a coalition brought big enough where the NCAA [National Collegiate Athletic Association] cannot possibly punish us all, then we can guarantee fairness at the collegiate level,” Noem added.

Noem said after consulting legal scholars she decided that the coalition to protect Title IX will be far more effective and cost-efficient than getting into a legal battle about transgender women playing on female sports teams.

“We’ve been trying to figure out how to defend women’s sports effectively. These legal scholars think that South Dakota’s chances of winning a lawsuit against the NCAA are very low. When it comes to this issue if South Dakota passes a law that’s against their policy, they will likely take punitive action against us.”

Recently, a letter signed by more than 500 college athletes was sent to the NCAA urging the organization to “only operate championships and events in states that promote an inclusive atmosphere.”

To date, close to 20 states have introduced legislation barring biological males from competing on female teams, including recently Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves, who signed such a bill for which his state is likely to be sued by civil rights and private organizations like the NCAA. Idaho was sued last year for such a bill.

Noem is trying to get around these legal issues by focusing on Title IX of the federal law. She said she is asking members of the coalition to sign a pledge to protect fairness in women’s sports.

The Pledge reads: “The undersigned agree that Title IX needs to be protected and that we commit to working together to keep fairness in women’s sports. We believe that only girls should play girls’ sports. Title IX was passed to protect fairness for women. The federal government should enforce Title IX in a way that protects fairness for women’s sports, rather than misusing it in a way that undermines fairness. The NCAA and other athletic sanctioning bodies should not take any adverse actions against any state or school that acts to protect fairness for women.”

The South Dakota governor said the coalition would refer to a person’s birth certificate designation to define their sexual identity.

Noem’s effort to protect the rights of biological female athletes by forming this national coalition is in sharp contrast to Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives passing the Equality Act, which they say is an anti-discrimination set of laws aimed at giving transgender individuals equal rights under the law. Opponents say it would penalize religious people for their beliefs about marriage and biological sex.

Last week Noem made headlines when she returned House Bill 1217 to the legislature with a ‘style and form veto’ with suggested revisions she wants to be made before signing.

At Monday’s press conference she said she is still eager to sign the bill if the changes are made.

Former NFL players Hershel Walker and Jack Brewer spoke at Noem’s press conference as advocates for keeping biological males out of female sports competitions.

“Now, I can classify myself as a woman and compete in the Olympics and probably win a gold medal in certain events today [by simply] saying I’m a woman,” said Walker.

Russian President Vladimir Putin meets with members of the public of Crimea via a video link in Moscow on March 18, 2021. (Alexey Druzhinin/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images)

By Li Hai March 22, 2021 Updated: March 22, 2021

The Russian Foreign Ministry has expressed regret that the Biden administration didn’t support the suggestion for a live discussion between the two world leaders, claiming that the United States missed an opportunity to improve bilateral relations.

“We regret to note that the American side has not supported the proposal made by President of Russia Vladimir Putin to U.S. President Joe Biden to hold a live broadcast discussion on March 19 or 22, 2021, on the problems that have accumulated in bilateral relations, as well as on the subject of strategic stability,” the ministry said in a statement on Monday.

Last week, Putin challenged Biden to a live debate after Biden called him a “killer” during an interview.

“I want to propose to President Biden to continue our discussion, but on the condition that we do it basically live, as it’s called. Without any delays and directly in an open, direct discussion,” Putin told Russian state TV on March 16.

Putin said he didn’t want to put it off for long and hoped the two leaders could do it either on March 19 or 22. “We are ready at any time convenient for the American side,” he said.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki responded on March 18 that discussion was unlikely, saying that Biden is scheduled to travel to Georgia the next day and is “quite busy.”

On March 19, White House deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre added that Biden would meet Putin “when the time is right.”

Biden “was asked a direct question, and he gave a direct answer, and he’s not going to back off. He’s going to be very frank and very open about that relationship, especially when he is asked directly,” Jean-Pierre said.

Before leaving Washington for Georgia on March 19, Biden told reporters, “I’m sure we’ll talk at some point.”

“One more opportunity has been missed to find a way out of the deadlock in Russian-US relations created through the fault of Washington,” the Russian Foreign Ministry added on Monday. “Responsibility for this lies entirely with the United States.”

The White House didn’t respond to a request from The Epoch Times for comment.

On March 20, Russian ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Antonov, left for Moscow. The embassy said the trip was to discuss ways to rectify Russia-U.S. relations “that are in crisis,” referring to the bilateral ties as being in a “deadlock.”

Earlier this month, Antonov criticized the United States for claiming that Russia had meddled in the 2020 election and poisoned Russian opposition figure Alexey Navalny.

The United States declared sanctions against Russia for the poisoning on March 2.

Jack Phillips and Zachary Stieber contributed to this report.

The San Diego Convention Center is seen in San Diego, Calif., on July 22, 2020. (Daniel Knighton/Getty Images) Immigration & Border Security

By Zachary Stieber March 23, 2021 Updated: March 23, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

The federal government is converting another convention center into a shelter for illegal immigrants amid a border surge that has shown no sign of slowing down.

Health Secretary Xavier Becerra requested help from the city of San Diego to house some of the unaccompanied minors who have been crossing into the United States from Mexico, Mayor Todd Gloria and San Diego County Board of Supervisors Chair Nathan Fletcher, both Democrats, said in a joint statement.

The officials agreed over the weekend to open the San Diego Convention Center to the federal government for use as a temporary shelter.

“The city and county will support this federally funded effort by providing vital services to these vulnerable children who came to our country seeking safety,” Gloria and Fletcher said. “We are working closely with our federal partners to finalize the details for preparing to receive these young people and provide them with care, compassion, and a safe space to transition while they are reunited with families or sponsors.”

No information was given as to how many children would be held, when they would start arriving, and which part of the border they would be coming from.

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) didn’t immediately respond to a request for more information.

City officials said the site can be used for as long as three months, with each minor staying there around 30 days. The children will be as old as age 17.

Minors will be provided with food, medical care, a place to sleep and showers, officials said in a statement to news outlets, adding: “A safe and secure recreation area will also be created on the exterior of the facility. The children are not permitted to leave the convention center until reunification occurs.”

Becerra, who was confirmed by the Senate last week and previously served as California’s attorney general, said in a statement that, “Every child in our care deserves a safe place to rest and to know their well-being is addressed.”

“The County and City of San Diego has generously offered to partner with the Department as we abide by the law to provide unaccompanied children with food, sanitation and shelter,” he said. “Our task is to protect the health and safety of unaccompanied children, who are under the care of the Office of Refugee Resettlement, while they go through their immigration proceedings.”

The United States is dealing with a surge in illegal immigrants and has opened or reopened at least four facilities in the past week to hold unaccompanied minors crossing the border.

An agreement was reached earlier this month to house young male migrants in the Kay Bailey Hutchinson Convention Center in Dallas, Texas.

Illegal border crossings breached 100,000 in February, President Joe Biden’s first full month in office. The number of unaccompanied minors apprehended by border agents jumped from 5,694 in January to nearly 9,300 the following month.

The administration stopped using Title 42 emergency powers amid the COVID-19 pandemic to expel minors, arguing it is not humane to do so. Critics say that decision, as well as confusing messaging from administration officials, has led to the surge.

Leaked photographs on Monday showed children sleeping on floors of a tent holding facility in Texas, with a single pod holding more than 400 unaccompanied male minors.

Border officials told reporters in a call last week that they had over 14,000 minors in custody, news outlets reported.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the photographs highlighted how Border Patrol facilities “are not places for children.”

A temporary processing facility in Donna, Texas, as seen in a photo released by Customs and Border Protection on Tuesday, March 23, 2021. (CBP) Immigration & Border Security

By Jack Phillips March 23, 2021 Updated: March 23, 2021

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials released photos of crowded temporary facilities being used to process illegal immigrants who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border in the midst of a recent surge in migration.

These photos, which were taken in a Donna, Texas, overflow facility, show what appear children sleeping shoulder-to-shoulder on floor mats with what appear to be aluminum blanks—and on benches. Another photo shows a large line of male illegal immigrants waiting to be processing, while another photo shows small children inside a playpen as a TV is showing children’s shows.

The photos were released after Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Texas) and Project Veritas separately released photos of children sleeping on the floor next to each other. Cuellar told Axios that they’re being kept in “terrible conditions” and said the CBP should transfer them to facilities operated by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).

“More has to be done to address this growing humanitarian crisis,” Cuellar also tweeted. “These migrant children need our help right now. Not later.”

At the same time, members of the media have complained that they are being denied access to observing and reporting on Border Patrol facilities.

On Tuesday, CBP said in a statement that it is continuing “to transfer unaccompanied minors to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as quickly and efficiently as possible after they are apprehended on the Southwest Border.”

The agency added: “In order to protect the health and safety of our workforce and those in our care we continue to discourage external visitors in our facilities; however, CBP is working to balance the need for public transparency and accountability. Still imagery and video are now available of the Donna Processing Center in Donna, Texas, and the Central Processing Center in El Paso, Texas.”

The photos also showed a long line of people waiting to use portable toilets that are apparently being used as restroom facilities for children. Another picture shows numerous children sleeping in a transparent pen.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters on Monday that the Biden administration is “working to finalize details” for allowing the press to see the Border Patrol facilities.

DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told several news outlets on Sunday that the previous administration is responsible for the immigrant housing situation, while Republicans have said that President Joe Biden’s policies—including a series of executive orders that rescinded several of the previous administration’s immigration rules—triggered the surge.

Former U.S. president Donald Trump addresses the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) held at the Hyatt Regency in Orlando, Florida, on Feb. 28, 2021. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images) Donald Trump

By Samuel Allegri March 22, 2021 Updated: March 22, 2021 biggersmallerPrint

Former President Donald Trump harshly criticized the Biden administration over their policies at the border in two interviews on Monday.

In respect of the growing number of illegal crossings, Trump said “They’ll be coming up by the millions,” in a podcast with Lisa Boothe, a Fox News host.

He warned that the situation will deteriorate toward more severe levels.

“It’s nothing compared to what’s going to be in a couple of months,” said Trump. “As I said before, you have some very bad hombres coming up and we’re taking them into our country and it’s insane.”

“They go into our country. We never find them again; they never come back, a very tiny percentage comes back,” Trump said, referring to the Biden administration’s return to the Obama-era “catch and release” policy in which asylum seekers are released into the interior of the country as they await a court hearing, often never to be seen again.

In another interview with Fox, Trump said most of the people unlawfully entering the country from the southern border are dangerous.

“Many of the people coming are not nonviolent people. They’re violent people, many of the people coming. These countries don’t send out their finest. And in some cases, I’m sure you have wonderful people,” Trump said via phone.

“But you also have criminals, you have murderers, you have sex traffickers. You have a lot of very bad people coming into our country. And they’re doing nothing about it. They’re going to be released or they’re already being released. Yesterday, they announced that they’re just going to let them go into the country. No courts, no nothing. It’s crazy to destroying our country,” he continued on the phone interview.

“People are just pouring into our country will destroy our country, they will destroy our country, you can’t take millions of people, they’ll have millions of people before this mess is over. And they’ve got some kind of a political theory, I guess that it’s a good thing, maybe. I don’t think it is, I think is a very bad thing for our country.”

The former president emphasized that people who want to enter the country should do so legally.

“Again, we want people to come in, but they have to be able to help our country, they have to come in through merit. And they have to come in legally,” Trump said.